


Sometimes it lasts in love, but sometimes it hurts instead

by Mahpiohanzia



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, DCU, Under the Red Hood
Genre: Angst, Bruce Wayne is Batman, Character Study, Dialogue Heavy, Dick Grayson is Nightwing, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, Jason Todd Needs A Hug, Jason Todd is Red Hood, Jason Todd-centric, One Shot, Self-Indulgent, Tim Drake is Robin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-28
Updated: 2019-03-28
Packaged: 2019-12-25 15:57:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,859
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18264605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mahpiohanzia/pseuds/Mahpiohanzia
Summary: “It’s alright, old man.” Jason suddenly wore a wan smile. “You are Batman. Batman is who you are. And Batman cannot kill. Nothing, not me, not the Joker, can ever change that."That day… That day when I held a gun on you and asked you to kill the Joker, when I asked you to choose between me and the Joker, I thought you chose the Joker. But now I realize I wasn’t asking you to choose between me and the Joker. I was asking you to choose between being my father and being Batman.”





	Sometimes it lasts in love, but sometimes it hurts instead

**Author's Note:**

> Set in an indeterminate timeline/universe after the events of Under the Red Hood. 
> 
> Title from Adele's "Someone Like You".

“Replacement,” Jason greeted Tim with his customary sneer, as he strode into the Batcave in full uniform, with his signature red helmet tucked under one arm.

Something in Tim snapped at the derogatory form of address. They had invited Jason to the Batcave as a gesture of goodwill, to entice him back into the fold by showing him how much easier his job would be if he had the backup and resources they could provide. But as much as Tim wanted Jason to rejoin the family, he would not stand to be disrespected and dismissed at every turn. 

“No! You don’t get to call me that!” Tim practically screamed as slammed his fists on the table and jumped to his feet. Jason stopped walking, a look of shock and wariness flickering momentarily across his face before it smoothed into an impassive mask. 

Bruce and Dick, who had both been poring over case files near the head of the table, looked up startled at the commotion, but none looked more startled than Tim himself.

But he took a deep breath and soldiered on. “You have no idea what Bruce, what we all, went through when you died. You have no idea how violent, how erratic he became… He was going to get himself killed! It was never about replacing you Jason, can’t you see it? I had to save Batman. Batman _needed_ a Robin!”

By the end of his little speech, Tim’s chest was heaving with emotion and his tone had changed from stern to something almost like pleading. A beat of stunned silence followed Tim’s uncharacteristic outburst. Jason stood stock still as if he were carved from stone, while Bruce just looked resigned.

Dick tried to reach out and pull Tim back to his seat, but Tim continued speaking, emboldened by Jason’s lack of response. “You were Robin for two-, nearly three, years Jason. You were Bruce’s _son_. Of course he mourned you. He mourned you so much that he went mad with it. He makes himself look at that damned glass case with your costume every single day to punish himself, so he never forgets the guilt of losing you, of being too late to save you.

“Hasn’t he been punished enough? Why do you have to punish him more by asking him to do the one thing you know he can’t do? Batman can’t kill, not even the Joker. You know that, Jason. You have to know that because you were _Robin_. You were a hero, my hero.”

Jason raised a hand, and Tim abruptly flinched back as if expecting to be struck. For a moment, he had forgotten just who he had been speaking to. Just because Jason hadn’t tried to kill him the last few times they had crossed paths did not mean that he couldn’t change his mind and decide to finish the job. 

But Jason just sighed at his reaction and ran a hand down his face, looking more tired than anything else. Then he said softly, “I suppose I should have expected that. My problems were always with B, and I never should have dragged you into that. I don’t know if I ever apologized for that, but I’m saying it now: I’m sorry. 

“My attacks on you were never personal… I don’t know if that makes you feel any better or worse. I didn’t know you well enough to really hate you, even back then. It was always about Bruce. 

“But now I know that you’re a good son to him. A good Robin. You have to be if you’re willing to defend him so staunchly to a man who nearly beat you death not so long ago.”

Tim was shocked. He had expected an angry retort, a punch to the face or maybe even a quick death by gun shot, but certainly not this. So he stood slack jawed, as Jason continued speaking, seemingly determined to shock him even more.

“You’re right, Tim.” Jason said, abruptly making eye contact with Tim. “I was Robin, I know why Batman can’t kill. Bruce Wayne became Batman so that no other child in Gotham would have to watch their parents be murdered in front of them. Batman can’t kill because the people he would kill may also have sons and daughters and families of their own, and if Batman killed them, he would be no better than the man who killed his own parents. 

“Batman is not accountable to anyone but himself. He needs to have some rules, even if they are rules he set upon himself, because without those rules, Batman would become the same kind of monster he was created to fight. It was unfair of me to ask that of him, and for that I am sorry.”

“So you understand, Jason,” Dick blurted out, a naked sort of hope blooming on his face. “You understand that we missed you, that we still miss you. No one could ever replace you, and that was never our intention. You understand that we couldn’t avenge you, no matter how much we wanted to. So come home, Little Wing, please-” 

Dick raised his arms and half got out of his chair as if he were going to hug Jason, but Jason neatly sidestepped him. Jason sucked in a deep breath and surveyed the looks on their faces. Dick’s hopeful expression was quickly morphing into disappointment, while Tim was still shocked and Bruce’s face was as blank as ever. 

“Let me speak. Please,” Jason said. Dick collapsed back in his chair and wrapped his arms around himself as if physically restrain himself from reaching out to Jason. “Of course, Little Wing. Whatever you need.”

Jason smiled sadly, but it didn’t reach his eyes. It was then that Tim knew that there was no way this was going to end the way Dick hoped. Of course it was too much to ask that Jason could just apologize for everything he did and everything would be fine and dandy. Of course it wouldn’t be that simple. There was no such thing as a happily ever after in their lives, and he should never have risked their uneasy truce by bringing up topics that could only cause pain to all of them.

Jason must have seen the contrition in his expression, because he looked genuinely remorseful when he said, “Dick, I know you think that me saying sorry to Bruce and Tim means it is all water under the bridge and we can go back to playing happy families. But just I like did not — cannot — know what it like for you to lose me, you cannot know what it was like for me to claw my way out of my own grave to find that I was replaced and unavenged.”

Dick moved to interrupt, “I thought we just talked about this Jason-” But his tone was more condescending than earnest this time around. Tim winced as Jason’s uncharacteristically calm demeanor shattered in an instant. 

“No, Dick,” Jason snarled. “We haven’t talked about this. You, you and Bruce and the Replacement, have talked about this. You have lectured me time and time again about _your_ rules and _your_ feelings. But have you ever spared a moment to think about _my_ side of the story? No! Now I will talk and you will listen!”

No one said anything for a minute. For all that Jason wanted to speak, he didn’t seem to know where to start. In for a penny, in for a pound, Tim thought as he nodded decisively and asked, “Why do you kill, Jason?”

Dick whirled on him incredulously, but Tim kept his eyes on Jason. “You don’t pull your punches, do you, kid?” Jason said with a huffed laugh. Then his voice turned solemn. “I kill because I am not Batman,” he said seriously. 

“Batman stops parents from being shot in front of their kids because there was no one who did that for him. Red Hood helps victims feel safe by making sure their abusers can never hurt them again because there was no one to do that for him. 

“In a city like Gotham, where money can make evidence disappear and there are prison breaks every other week, there is no other way to protect innocents. When you have the power to make sure that the bad guys can never hurt anyone ever again but still keep putting them back in prisons you know they can break out off, at some point, the blood of the people they kill are on your hands. With great power comes great responsibility and all that jazz.”

“We do not get to decide who lives and who dies,” Bruce spoke up for the first time that night. He spoke in monotone, as if reciting from a script. “What gives you the right to play judge, jury and executioner?” 

“No one gave me the right,” Jason agreed, almost amicably. “Just like no one gave you the right to go out at night dressed like a giant bat and beat on criminals. Last I checked, vigilantism is illegal.

“So just like you stay accountable to yourself by setting your own rules, I have rules of my own. They just happen to be different from yours.”

“Oh, and what are these precious rules of yours?” Dick asked snidely. Tim started because he had never heard such a malicious tone of voice from Dick before. 

“You were always reckless and violent and completely out of control even when you were Robin. How are you any better than the killers you kill? One killer kills another and the number of killers in the world remains the same.” Dick looked so smug and self-righteous at his pronouncement that Tim wouldn’t have been surprised if Jason just punched him in the face.

“But if one killer kills a hundred others, aren’t there ninety nine less killers in the world?” Jason asked wryly rather than take offense. “I kill only traffickers, rapists and dealers that sell drugs to kids. Those are my rules. Killing isn’t a game to me, not like it is for psychopaths like the Joker. But neither is _not_ killing a way to keep my moral high ground, like it is for you Bats. The world isn’t black and white, Dickie.”

“So why didn’t you kill the Joker yourself?” Tim asked mildly. Dick looked horrified, but Tim kept talking. “I mean, you could’ve done it at any time. Why did you go to all the trouble of establishing yourself as a crime lord and leading us on an elaborate game of cat and mouse just to set up a confrontation? 

“If you could take over all the drug trade in this city in less than a year, you could’ve definitely killed the clown yourself without anyone the wiser. But you wanted _Bruce_ to do it even though you knew that Batman would never kill the Joker.”

“And that’s the million dollar question, isn’t it?” Jason asked bitterly. “I never wanted _Batman_ to kill the Joker,” he whispered hoarsely. He seemed to realize how raw and vulnerable he sounded, but visibly steeled himself to continue. “I needed _Bruce_ to kill the Joker.

“Because despite everything, Bruce was my father, and I needed my father to protect me from the man who killed me. I was a scared little boy who needed his Dad to get rid of the monster in the closet so he could sleep without nightmares of crowbars and red smiles and creepy laughter.”

“Jason.” Bruce said. “Jason, I-” He sounded wrecked.

“It’s alright, old man.” Jason suddenly wore a wan smile. “You are Batman. Batman is who you are. And Batman cannot kill. Nothing, not me, not the Joker, can ever change that. 

“That day… That day when I held a gun on you and asked you to kill the Joker, when I asked you to choose between me and the Joker, I thought you chose the Joker. But now I realize I wasn’t asking you to choose between me and the Joker. I was asking you to choose between being my father and being Batman.”

“Jason.” Bruce said again, sounding even more wrecked if such a thing was even possible. He didn’t seem to know what else to say. Tim and Dick were frozen in their seats.

“But I had forgotten my father _is_ Batman. There is no distinction between the two, not for you,” Jason mused out loud, as if Bruce hadn’t spoken at all. “And you cannot change who you are, especially not for a failed Robin who came back wrong.”

“You are not a failed Robin, Jason, you are my _son_ ,” Bruce said emphatically, as if willing Jason to accept it through the force of his conviction alone.

Jason laughed, a harsh sound entirely devoid of joy. “Is that why the plaque says ‘A Good Soldier’?” he said mockingly as he gestured to the glass case that held the costume he had died in. 

“Oh, the irony! I thought I died because I _wasn’t_ a ‘good soldier’. That case isn’t a reminder of your guilt, it’s a reminder of what happens when you disobey the great Bat’s orders. You reduced all that I was to a cautionary tale, a costume in a case, one of your many soldiers in an ultimately futile crusade for justice. Was all I ever was to you? A tool? A means to an end?”

“You know that’s not true, Jason!” Dick cried, desperate to avert this morbid turn of conversation. For all that Dick was free with his affection, he too was a Bat and was unused to witnessing and dealing with such raw emotions. 

“You’re right, Dick,” Jason agreed, stunning Dick into silence. “That is not all I was. If Bruce really wanted to punish himself, he should’ve remembered me as his son and not just as his soldier. He should’ve remembered the boy he took to baseball games, the boy who vowed to read every book in the library, the boy who loved learning to cook from Alfred. 

“He should’ve remembered the boy who was afraid he would never be as good as Dick Grayson, the boy who he constantly railed on for being too reckless and violent, the boy who ran halfway across the world to find a parent who might have accepted him as he was.”

“I understand why you didn’t,” Jason told Bruce, with a sad sense of acceptance that was somehow more hurtful than his blistering anger. “It was too hard for you to acknowledge the loss of a son, but you weren’t callous enough not to acknowledge the loss of your soldier. 

“I understand why you haven’t taken it down either, despite me standing here, living and breathing, right in front of you, because I’m not really your soldier or your son anymore. That boy died at fifteen and _stayed_ dead, regardless of the lack of a body in his coffin.”

“Jason, you are still—” Dick tried to say something, but Jason cut him off. 

“But what I don’t understand is how you could allow yet another child to wear my colors, before my body was even cool in the ground. Robin should have died with me. How could you bring yet another child into your crusade after you already buried one? How could you endanger yet another child when you know that there are monsters like the Joker that target them solely for their association with you?”

“Monsters like you?” Bruce asked coldly. Dick whirled on him incredulously, but Tim understood where he was coming from. If Jason didn’t want him to be Robin because he could be killed, then why would he try to kill him at all? 

“Yes, monsters like me,” Jason agreed calmly. “After all, the point I was trying to make was that I could have killed him if I wanted to. If my death hadn’t shown you that children are not safe under your watch, then I hoped I could open your eyes to it this time around.”

“Not to mention you wanted to hurt us and Tim was a convenient target,” observed Dick bitterly.

“Yes, I wanted to hurt you. Just like you wanted to hurt Bruce when he first brought me in and took it out on me because I was a convenient target.” Jason shot back and Dick recoiled as if slapped.

There was long and charged silence where no one knew quite what to say that would not spark a full blown argument. Finally, Jason sighed audibly and rubbed his face tiredly. The fight seemed to drain out of him and his body sagged as if he had the weight of the world on his shoulders. He looked as though he had aged a decade. 

“Look, I didn’t come here to fight. I know you called me here so you could pretend to ask for my help on a case and get another chance to reform me or whatever. But I am not one of of you. Not anymore. And if that makes me a monster, so be it.”

And then he walked away.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


End file.
